driving in NJ

it’s been kind of a rough week with the commuting. Last week it went fine — I kept telling people “well, it’s 45 minutes, but it hasn’t killed me so far…” Even though I knew “so far” meant “in the last 3 days” I didn’t really think it would be horrible to drive up to 45 minutes. I MUCH prefer public transportation, natch! but in the very most northern neck of the woods where I work, even though there’s a train station, 1. there’s no good way to travel the 2 miles from the station to my office and 2. the earliest train gets there 15 minutes after work starts.

This week has been frustrating. my 45 minute commute has turned into an hour 2 mornings, and at least 3 evenings have been exercises in dancing slowly with about 10,000 other drivers. If I want to meet a friend in NYC for dinner I can’t honestly say I’ll get there before 7, because if I leave at 5:20, I drive to Jersey City, park the car, walk to the PATH, take the PATH in, and THEN get where I’m going in NY. I could drive into Manhattan but you have to stop somewhere! I really don’t want the thousands-of-pounds tether that a car is when I’m hanging out in NY.

Today, though, was great. I got up 10 minutes earlier than usual and left at MOST 20 minutes earlier than I usually do. There weren’t that many people out, and I got to work a full 30 minutes before work starts — I might have shaved a whole 35 minutes off of my commute! from now on, the 10 minutes of sleep are officially sacrificed. I don’t care if I’ll be at work 30 minutes before I ought to be. I am SURE I can find something to do with myself…

[[unless it’s an April’s Fools joke on me!]]

[[reposted b/c of server problems.]]